The Shepherds went back glorifying and praising God for all they had seen

A priest in a Middle East country racked with killings wrote recently to a group of friends, and his short story touched me and the others.

“29th December 2011 Here is a small sign of life from a city that you will know because of the bad news from it of the last months. We live in a war situation here. We have a curfew which begins early in the afternoon, what means that if you dare to go out on the street, you take the risk that someone will fire on you.

It is not possible to hold meetings or other gatherings of people. So Christmas mass was impossible. Each day we celebrate mass at our house with perhaps 10 people, no more. The number is always small but the faith is strong. Often people have to overcome their fear to come. They are attracted by something I do not understand; in an atmosphere which I would dare to call Jesus among us. The people really want to come and several of them come each day. They become true friends in the Lord, gathered by Him. Christmas in these circumstances became for me a unique experience which filled me with a joy which is perhaps something like the simple and natural joy of the shepherds of the Gospel at that first Christmas.

As the New Year is upon us I wanted to share with all of you something of the joy of Jesus among us, and so I have written these few lines to you.”

I was then also touched by the Gospel on Sunday 1st January, New Year’s Day and the Feast of Mary, the Mother of God. “The shepherds hurried away to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger. When they saw the child they repeated what they had been told about him, and everyone who heard it was astonished at what the shepherds had to say….And the shepherds went back glorifying God for all they had heard and seen: it was exactly as they had been told”.

The Shepherds in the time of Jesus were at the bottom of the heap in the rankings of society. Those at the top in the Holy Land of those days were the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Tax Collectors, the priests, good Jews like Joseph the foster father of Jesus and probably a small builder, those who ran small businesses, traders, farmers, fishermen, small shop owners and the like. Shepherds had to get up early, work all night as well, got low pay, and were often robbers and thieves in the hills. God sent the angel at the first Christmas to these who were among the least in society, and it was they who celebrated with Mary and Joseph the birth of Jesus, the Saviour of the World. It is said in the gospel that when the angel appeared to them “the glory of the Lord shone round they them. They were terrified, but the angel said, ‘Do not be afraid. Listen, I bring you new of great joy, a joy to be shared by the whole people. Today in the town of David a saviour has been born for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger’. And suddenly with the angel there was a great throng of the heavenly host, praising God and singing, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and peace to men who enjoy his favour’.

I wonder about those shepherds. Were they terrified as if they had been found out and had to own up to their bad deeds? Did some of them become followers of Jesus, saw his miracles and heard Jesus preaching,  and in their old age after Jesus had died and risen did they tell their story to the community of faith that St. Luke the evangelist belonged to? The detail of what happened is quite striking as though somebody who had been present had passed on what actually occurred.

I wonder also about my priest friend: he too seems to glorify God for all he had seen and heard in his war situation. He seems to have been given eyes to see and ears to hear what he had never heard before at Christmas in the midst of the most dangerous difficulties. Certainly his reaction is like that of the shepherds at the first Christmas. May we exult at the presence of God among us, in the good relationships we try to build often amid difficulties of a different nature; and may our faith and trust in God be as strong as those Christian lay people risking their lives to get to mass.

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